


Marshall

by mcaulfield



Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/F, Fluff, Pets, Political Marriage, Sylvanas Just Wants A Friend, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-06
Updated: 2020-08-06
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:27:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25750579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcaulfield/pseuds/mcaulfield
Summary: Based on a prompt from Tumblr user secretvoidpuff!Sylvanas has a pet. It's not a normal pet, and Jaina didn't know about it until it startled her one morning by landing on their windowsill and screeching.
Relationships: Jaina Proudmoore/Sylvanas Windrunner
Comments: 25
Kudos: 258





	Marshall

Another dead mouse at the door.  _ Great.  _

Jaina sighed deeply, wondering whether the strays of Boralus had, once again, decided the side entrance to the Keep — which opened directly into their wing — was where they could find the most appreciation. Except...there was one problem with this, and that was the inconsistency of the timing and unwavering consistency in the creature. Even the fur color was the same each time: brown, a little ashy, like a field mouse. In the past, various odd trophies would be left at the door ranging from small mice and sewer rats to bats and birds. The differences almost made Jaina wonder if it was a prank one of the local kids was pulling to express their distaste for her political union with the Warchief.

Picking it up gingerly by its tail with her gauntleted hand, Jaina scrunched her nose up in disgust and brought it to one of the trash bins — an  _ outdoor  _ trash bin. She stared at it for a moment before dropping it in, and that’s when she saw them: tiny claw marks that had marred the mouse’s fur and skin, almost as if it had been carried there by a bird. But the claw marks were too small for it to have been a bird. The only birds that preyed upon mice were the larger falcons, usually seen around Drustvar. These were tiny claws, small enough for both feet of the animal to grip it. She dropped it in the trash, vowing to get to the bottom of things.

Once inside, she deposited her gauntlet in the bin for servants to clean and began to dress down to the doeskin leggings and light tunic she often wore under her robes. She spared a small glance at her wife, who was hunched over what were surely more trade agreements that she’d have to hunch over and sign later, as well. Though the beginning of their marriage was fraught with tension, mistrust, and hostility, it had turned out that they actually got along quite well — they’d just needed a good, angry fuck to get acquainted as something other than bitter enemies.

Jaina, momentarily forgetting the dead field mice that had taken to showing up at their doorstep, smiled softly at the memory and paced over to Sylvanas, placing her hand on her wife’s upper back. She leaned forward and kissed her cheek, the smallest of almost-smiles appearing on her wife’s lips.

“More trade deals?” She murmured, staying close and looking over her wife’s shoulder for the moment. Sylvanas hummed in affirmation, never really one for many words outside of her taste for needling Alliance leaders in meetings. “Just leave them in the bin on my desk when you can,” she continued. “I think you’ll find it blessedly empty, for once.”

She’d spent the previous day entirely on paperwork that she was perpetually behind on, papers usually spilling out of it and onto her desk by the end of the week. Sylvanas would often tease her for it, though it was good-natured. That was something that had taken Jaina the better part of this first year of their marriage to grow accustomed to. She looked at Sylvanas again.

“Hey, you wouldn’t happen to have noticed the dead mice that have started to show up at our door, would you?” She asked.

Sylvanas’s hand froze over where she’d been about to sign, her ears picking up slightly and her jawline going tense. A droplet of ink fell from the pen to the parchment, and she placed the pen down gingerly. Jaina’s brow furrowed.  _ What’s all this about?  _ She wondered.

“I...have,” Sylvanas murmured, tone measured, almost sounding  _ embarrassed  _ about it. But Jaina couldn’t imagine what could be  _ embarrassing  _ about noticing such a small inconvenience.

“Sylv…?” Jaina prodded when Sylvanas didn’t say anything further and did not return to her paperwork. She tried to search her wife’s eyes for any indication of what was going on, but it was difficult to with the way Sylvanas avoided her gaze.

“I’m sure it’s nothing,” Sylvanas finally responded, picking up the pen again and resuming her work. But Jaina was not convinced.

And she was right not to be. One day, when Sylvanas had gone for a hunt as she often did once all of her work was finished for the week, Jaina was in their quarters getting dressed for the day. She’d slept in, so the sun was already up and streaming in through their windows. With how rare sun was in the springtime in Boralus, Jaina decided it would be the perfect day to open their windows for the first time of the year.

Not a minute later, Jaina shrieked as a bony little creature, looking ragged and mottled, landed on the windowsill and produced a high-pitched, raspy screech. It was such a small sound, particularly when compared with Jaina’s reaction, but it was enough to cause the Lord Admiral to jump backwards before she was even sure what she was looking at. When Jaina had shrieked, its little ears had pressed back, not unlike a certain wife of hers. The two stared at each other for a moment, the little creature hopping from one foot to the other and tilting its head curiously. Carefully, Jaina stepped closer to it, trying to get a good look at what it was.

Its ears were triangular and large for its tiny head, one of them torn slightly on the edge. It had patchy fur and looked entirely too skinny to be healthy, its wings practically translucent with how thin the leathery skin stretched over its bones. And the look of its feet caused Jaina to inhale sharply, which caused the little creature’s ears to press back once more. They were, essentially, just bone. If Jaina didn’t know better, if she hadn’t heard its raspy call and seen it tilt its head, she would have assumed it was  _ dead.  _ It was a bat.

But what was a small, ragged  _ bat  _ doing on her windowsill in the morning? And why was it looking at her like it expected something? It hopped closer to her by an inch or two, which had her shrinking back slightly. She glanced to the window which was still swung open, wondering if she’d be able to close it in time before this thing decided to fly into her room and play hide and seek in the entire Keep.

“Ah, I see you’ve...finally met.”

Jaina startled again, Sylvanas’s voice a reluctant drawl from the doorway across the room. She didn’t dare look away from the creature on her windowsill, though she had many questions as to what Sylvanas could possibly mean. The little bony bat quirked its head again, a small chittering sound leaving its throat as it hopped sideways to look around Jaina. Its ears perked up, much as Sylvanas’s tended to when she was pleased to see Jaina after a long day. Without preamble, it released another high-pitched screech and flew into the room around Jaina.

“No—!” Jaina cried out, spinning around as the bat flew past her. She was going to say more, exclaim how they’d now have to chase a surely disease-ridden  _ bat  _ around their quarters before it had the chance to find its way into the rest of the Keep, until she saw it rest on Sylvanas’s index finger, which she held out in front of her face with something akin to  _ fondness  _ in her eyes. “What…?”

“I believe the living call them  _ pets,  _ Jaina,” Sylvanas drawled, a touch of warmth in her voice as she seemed to give the bat a once-over.

“P... _ pets?”  _ Jaina stammered, not sure how she could reconcile the idea of a dog, or a cat, or even a  _ fish  _ with this nearly-dead thing. Something quickly clicked inside of her. “Is  _ this  _ what’s been leaving field mice at our door?”

“Yes. I had hoped I’d be able to keep on top of that, but it seems Marshall here doesn’t keep regular hours these days,” Sylvanas explained as if it were the most mundane thing in the world. Jaina stared at her, jaw slightly slack, as she tried to process the information.

“Marshall?” Jaina was having trouble coming up with more than one word at a time. In response to his name, the little bat fluttered and turned around to look at her, tilting its —  _ his?  _ — head this way and that, as though it recognized its name.

“Yes, that is the name I gave him when I first raised him.”

“You...raised him. You  _ raised  _ him?”

“His spirit lingered restlessly near his body. I found him out near the Crimson Forest in Drustvar. I asked him if he wanted to come along with me, and it was easy to coax his spirit back into his bones,” Sylvanas explained.

“You raised a bat.”

“Yes, and his name is Marshall.” Marshall chittered at the sound of his name again.

“How...does that even work?” Jaina asked, slowly feeling her mental processing abilities return to her as she made eye contact with the little bat. Which, she now realized, had beady little eyes that were black but almost held a red glow to them, not unlike its... _ master? Owner? She said he’s...a pet.  _

“The magic that ties a soul to its body is delicate, and extremely intricate,” Sylvanas began, moving to her desk and putting the finger Marshall was perched on near the back of her chair as she sat. He hopped over to it and ruffled his wings. Jaina furrowed her brow, unsure how she felt about it still. “With the races of the living — humans, orcs, trolls, what have you — it is fairly straightforward and binding. But animal souls are finicky. Their lives are much more fleeting and their brains are far simpler. It’s harder to get it to...stick, I suppose,” she continued, running the tip of her finger along Marshall’s untorn ear. He flicked it, again reminding Jaina of Sylvanas’s ears. “He remembers his life, and any time I’ve raised him, but—”

“Wait. You’ve raised him more than once?”

“Yes, Jaina. Now, if you could just let me explain?” Sylvanas responded, narrowing her eyes slightly. Jaina huffed, exasperated by the entire situation, and perched on the edge of the bed facing Sylvanas. Sylvanas raised one eyebrow at her, as if waiting for her to interject again. She didn’t, instead raising her own eyebrow and inclining her head for Sylvanas to continue. “Thank you. Binding his soul back to his body is not something I have quite the right finesse with yet,” she resumed explaining. “I can get the ties to stick for a few hours at a time, now, but slowly he begins to lose touch with his physical form again. He drifts, but never too far, bit by bit until he no longer has much coordination to function. I usually sever the tie then. It seems cruel to let it go on for too long.”

Jaina sat there for a moment, just taking it all in. Sylvanas was scratching gently behind Marshall’s ear, and the little bat was leaning into her touch. There was a softness in Sylvanas’s eyes that was usually reserved for her, post-coitus, and a pang of something between sympathy and sadness shot through her. They wouldn’t say they  _ loved  _ each other yet, but she had grown to care deeply for the Warchief and was learning more and more that she was not so unlike anyone else. She had desires, pleasures, and needs all her own, and it seemed the companionship of an animal was one of them.

“Where does he, um...stay? When he’s not…?” Jaina dared to ask.

“In my desk,” Sylvanas replied nonchalantly.

“I— in your  _ desk?  _ We’ve had a dead  _ bat  _ in our rooms this whole time?” She asked, blanching.

“I keep him in a special box,” Sylvanas replied, seeking to placate Jaina. She reached into the lower right drawer and pulled out a beautiful, rosewood box that resonated with a gentle arcane power. “It’s warded for preserving the bodies of beloved family pets,” she explained. “It seems to work nicely.”

Jaina looked at the box, then at Marshall, and finally at Sylvanas, who looked at her almost like a child about to ask their parent, ‘can we keep it?’ She sighed, standing and taking a cautious step towards the two. Marshall, sensing her movement, stopped leaning into Sylvanas’s touch as much and looked up at her. If she didn’t know better, she’d say he looked...almost happy? Puppy-like, in a strange way.

“Why do you think he leaves mice at our door?” She asked quietly as she got closer.

“He can’t eat it, so...probably the same reason cats do,” Sylvanas replied.  _ Right. Undead don’t eat, usually,  _ Jaina remembered. She took another step towards Marshall and Sylvanas, crouching down so she was more at eye-level with the little bat. If one could get past his skeletal paws, there  _ was  _ something...almost endearing about his scraggly appearance, she supposed.

“Is he...happy?” She dared to ask.

“I think so,” Sylvanas replied. “He is always eager to return to his body and spends long hours flying about between here and Falconhurst.”

Jaina hummed in quiet acknowledgement, cautiously raising her hand towards Marshall. He chittered, bouncing slightly away from Sylvanas’s touch towards the middle of the back of her chair. Jaina met him there, cautiously running her fingertip down the back of one of his ears, as if she were touching a miniature version of Sylvanas’s in a gesture she knew the elf found soothing. He leaned into the touch, the peach fuzz on the back of his ear almost soft.

“He seems...sweet,” she murmured, still not entirely sure what to make of Marshall’s sudden appearance in their lives.

“He is,” Sylvanas replied simply, looking down at Jaina with a small smile. “I’ve been working on getting him to stay bound to his body for longer periods of time.”

“Is it...like spellwork?” Jaina asked, wondering if she could perhaps help Sylvanas with the intricacies of it. She knew next to nothing about necromancy, much less whatever powers Sylvanas wielded, but she did know a lot about spell matrices and the way arcane interacted with souls.

“Perhaps,” Sylvanas replied. “I’m not exactly sure what spellwork and spellweaving entail, but I know the mages who have become apothecaries in undeath say the two are not so dissimilar.”

“Maybe I could help,” Jaina offered, looking up at Sylvanas.

“Maybe so,” Sylvanas replied with warmth in her eyes. Maybe they wouldn’t have said they loved each other yet, but...perhaps they were getting there.

**Author's Note:**

> If you'd like to see the original prompt, I reblogged it over on my new tumblr, @caulfield-fics!


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